Accepting Good Days

A lot of my posts are about struggles. It’s always been my intention to try and give a voice to the tough times that often don’t get mentioned in our social media pool of perfection. It does mean that my own life can sometimes look a bit gruesome. So today’s post is basically my way of saying “Hey Mum and Dad, look I do have good days too, don’t worry.”.

I tried to think of how I’d describe a good day then I got worried that if other people didn’t feel they had the same things they might take a good day and view it as rubbish. I think every time I’m feeling good I’d probably list a completely different set of reasons for why I feel good on that day. The thing those lists would probably have in common is that it’s about how I feel doing tasks, and how I feel towards myself, for me it isn’t really about what jobs get done. I’ve had awful days where I’ve been really productive and fantastic days where I’ve not got much done. To do lists are great ways to motivate yourself and keep organised but it doesn’t score your worth, not crossing any items off because you needed a day cuddling teddies does not make you less valuable.

Teddies also available for bad and medium and every other sort of day.

One of the struggles I have long term is accepting the good days within the bad. There’s always guilt somewhere:

• guilty for not fixing myself on other days,
• guilty for not making the most of good days,
• guilty for feeling good whilst others feel bad,
• guilty for feeling good in the middle of a global pandemic.

And I’m sure there are many more.

It’s really hard when your brain bullies yourself so often to accept good things. We are so used to telling ourselves we are rubbish it’s very easy to feel we don’t deserve good things.

YOU DESERVE EVERY AWESOME MOMENT YOU GET.

The anxiety guilt isn’t going to fix any of the problems you feel guilty about. Enjoy the good and happy moments, whether it’s the fact you managed to get out of bed without arguing with yourself or you got on with work without your body freezing. Give yourself the metaphorical gold star (or a real one, why don’t more adults have sticker charts?). Your struggles don’t make you less deserving of this good day, so enjoy it, savour it, bank away the memory and take the win.

Turn Anxiety Into Peanut Butter

Every now and then I like to write something about the down moments and my unsuccessful mornings. Mainly to try balance the social media pool and dilute the perfect selfies.
Today started a bit tense struggling to get out of bed. I’m finding this particularly hard at the moment; there’s builders in the garden. Sensory overload triggers my anxiety and if I don’t get out of bed before they arrive I find all the sounds overwhelming.
I managed to stick to my routine, breakfast, coffee, up to my desk in the loft room. Within an hour though I was struggling. I was feeling fulling of tension and my concentration was on breathing and grounding, the work that sat in front of me wasn’t getting done and it was making me feel worse. Being surrounded by screens really doesn’t help when I get like this.
I gave up on work and I made some peanut butter. The key thing I wanted to write here is about social media. Me posting a picture of me making homemade condiments during a lockdown is bound to make others feel like a failure because they aren’t being as wonderfully productive as social media presents everyone else. But this isn’t a symbol of how great my day is, it’s a sign that today is tough, today I’m struggling, today I needed to crush some stuff together and give my brain some room to process things.

So now I’m back at my desk just about managing some admin. Unable to make sense of my research as the ideas go in and out. I’ve got my blue light glasses on to help with the screens. The cute frames don’t harm my confidence either. 🙂

Along with my anxiety mentor,  my doctor (and some medication) I’ve got to a point where I can cope with my anxiety levels. I’m aware of my triggers and when I’m starting to get worse most of the time I know what to do to look after myself. But looking after me doesn’t get my work done.

The hardest thing is to not bully myself about that, so I want to dedicate this to every student and academic who feels research guilt when they prioritise time for themselves. Your research needs your brain, if you bully yourself about not getting work done when you couldn’t do it ,then the bully isn’t going to get the work done either. You can only do what your brain allows you to, everyone else isn’t you, their research is different, their brain is different, their capacity is different. You can only do what you can do.
A big lockdown cuddle from me and the desk teddies (Maple syrup and Peter rabbit – breakfast name to be decided).